July prepping

Well, it's July already! Summer is in full swing! So what is everyone working on?

Hello all, garden is in full swing 10+ zuch's on the vines. I found a local LDS cannery about an hour a way. I called them and the lady was super sweet. they are open one day a week, non church members are welcome, prices are half of honeyville's. I have been wanting to build a storage of long term (most is 30 yr shelf life). you buy the food in bulk there, can it yourself there. So I plan on investing maybe $50 every 2 weeks, starting with wheat , in a couple weeks.  My short term (1-3 years shelf life)  will continue to be a stocked pantry with home dehydrated and canned goods.                 Yes, i have been wanting a wood stove also but have been trying to decide if the money would be better spent paying on deb, I will decide by Oct. I think that with the whole 2012 hype getting closer that prices will go up as more people prep. I am more concerned about financial decline and inflation, and pandemics.

I would bet that LDS has a cannery in every major city where they have LDS churches. Denver has one. Contact any LDS church and they will be happy to tell you where a cannery is located in your area.

Most LDS members do not talk about the canneries because most people think it is strange to prep. We are unusual people here on this Fourm.

Hey Flu Mom,

Yep, Elver, I know the one in Aurora. Thanks for the suggestion. I have a very good friend who goes to that one. She said the potato pearls were really super good. Have to try those.

I never used the cannery because I purchase all my stuff from Walton Foods and places like that. I am now going through all my supplies right now. I had a leak in my basement, small but had to get some wall board put up and replace some ceiling tiles. So now I am getting my supplies organized again.

Getting rid of really old can goods from the grocery store. Not going to replace much of it because there are only two of us and we don't use can goods. I cook most everything fresh. I do purchse can chicken and tuna use those things.

Keep prepping something will happen one of these days.

Im thinking as long as the powder is sealed it should be ok...Yes I threw away 50lbs of rice because of little tiny bugs. Yuck !

Melody, Yes please do, dont make my mistake ! I couldnt see them with the naked eye. I poured about 3 cups of rice in a colored bowl, sifted it around, the bugs were almost transparent and stuck to the bowl sides. I did find a few smaller bags that didnt have any, (white rice) this was some of my oldest preps, I froze it and repackaged it for my dog. I will mix a little cooked rice in an emergency to add to her diet. I will toss it in another year.

Just thought I'd mention that I have opened an experimental jar of 5 year old dehydrated tomatoes.  These were dehydrated, placed in quart canning jars and vacuum sealed. I use canning jars as they are continuously recyclable from canning back to dehydration and so on.  The seal was still good and so were the tomatoes.  They were stored in about 65 - 75 degrees in a dark pantry.  I have always wondered how dehydrating would hold up against the freeze drying process which cant be accomplished properly without one of those expensive vacuum/.freezing/sublimation type machines--(obviously these work better long term).  I've used these machines in labs where the same technology is used for dehydrating medical samples and all.  Anyway, I thought this (my tomatoes) were a great promotion for what many of you are doing with food storage ideas involving dehydration of all of the great garden produce and worth mentioning.  I use this same simple technique for dried rice beans corn etc--keeps the bugs out because bugs don't breathe well in a vacuum--also you can do the deep freeze thing of course to kill them before you vacuum seal them.  So far I have never had a bug get in--or out. :)  Zucchini is alive and well in my garden but we have had a plague of locust which tried to eat everything else--fought them for days with all kinds of natural bug remedies--(they don't like garlic but that didn't stop them from trying to take out everything else).  If anyone has any ideas on grasshopper protection other than frying them up and eating them--please let me know.  Thanks!

I have had a plague of tomato worms this year. I have planted 36 tomato plants and pick worms off them every day.  I ordered some Bacillus T and am hoping that will help. One little worm eats a whole leaf!  The heirlooms are getting the worst of it but the hybrids are affected to.

Suzi10 wrote: Does anybody know what happened to Mary008? She posted like she was on the payroll and then one day I noticed she was gone.

 

Well, I don't have a garden yet. Just 1 tomato plant and 1 green pepper plant. With my health issues I can't dig a garden and my husband has enough to do with work, cutting grass and fixing up this house. So I was trying my hand at potted plants...well, just the 2 for now.

I am so jealous that you had tomatoes, Suzi! I have all kinds of recipes standing by waiting for my crop to ripen.  I have a ton of green tomatoes as well.  We live in Ca. and have had a very cool spring.  The thing is, I started these plants on my dining room table in March! I guess next year I will have to start in January! 

Rice keeps a really long time. It will keep long years longer than a use by date and even longer if you vacume seal it and keep it cool. It does have a pest. Tiny little weevil you can barely see. You can easily see the sand like mess at the bottom of the bag.

3 years is ok. Is it discolored? Storage temp affects the time it will be good. My vacume packed bags look the best. Really look just like they did when I did them. I wrote the exp date on some, 2010. I probably did them in 07. I would not throw it away now even if I thought it was a little discolored. Buy some more for yourself and keep the old to give away. Hungry people will not know the difference. This debt ceilling thing has me nervous. I bought 25 dollars worth of seed yesterday. The guy was scraping the bin on the zipper cream peas. I got two kinds of peas, green beans, okra and zukuni. He said they would not get any more seed until next spring. If things are not sounding good Tues I am going back for some corn. 

Are you putting it into the freezer to kill any bugs that might be in it? If so a day or two should do it. Be sure to let it get to room temp before storing. Condensation will collect on it while it is cold.